Cape Breton railway fees remain controversial

About 40 residents attended a meeting Tuesday evening in Little Bras d'Or of the Cape Breton Railway Victims Asssociation to find out what's next if the Cape Breton and Central Nova Scotia Railway discontinue freight rail service from St. Peter's Junction to to Sydney.Elizabeth Patterson - Cape Breton Post

LITTLE BRAS D'OR — There were residents, a provincial cabinet minister, an MLA, and municipal leaders at the Little Bras d'Or Hall on Tuesday when the Cape Breton Railway Victims Association held its meeting about what to do now that the Cape Breton Central and Nova Scotia Railway has decided to to abandon the St. Peter's Junction-to-Sydney rail line.

While there was a good cross-section from the community, no one attended from the rail company itself, a fact that didn't impress landowner and organizer Ken Jardine.

"I wish the railway had come," Jardine said. "They're very ill-advised to not engage the people that they literally have to live with."

Provincial Transportation Minister Geoff MacLellan did attend and learned that while the company has been charging a total of $4,000 in fees for each time a single utility is established on a piece of land, Jardine said he had clarification from the Nova Scotia Utility and Review Board that a total of only $300 can be charged.

"It's mind-boggling that you are being charged $4,000 for each utility," said MacLellan, adding it sounds like a situation that could be easily fixed, although he also acknowledged that it could be more complicated than it initially seems.

And when Jardine estimated the municipality had paid the company about $875,000 in fees, Dist. 1 Coun. Clarence Prince stood up and clarified that the amount was just over $1.488 million since 1998.

"I asked our acting CAO what would be the updated amount and she said since 1998, the fees have been $1.488 million," said Prince. "And that includes the payments to the three companies, so that's a substantial amount of money that I'm sure a lot of us weren't quite aware that we'd have to pay or that amount of money existed, so I'm glad we were here to give that information to the group."

MacLellan told the 50 people in attendance that it does seem as though the company is not interested in keeping the rail line going at all since it would need more rail traffic to be profitable but to handle more rail traffic, a substantial investment would have to be made in the railway's infrastructure.

"But at the same time, we've got to keep the economy going," said MacLellan.

MP Mark Eyking said that too much privatizing of the railway has led to the present situation.

"We need to get back to a national strategy on the railway," he said. "I think the federal government is finding out that we gave up too much control to these private companies."

At the end of the night, Jardine said he felt the meeting was a good one and that the provincial government was on side with the residents.

"It's a very complicated issue and we said this seven years ago — this was not going to get solved over night," said Jardine, who's now sending a letter the minister to reiterate the group's position and to get an official timeline.

"I'm cautiously optimistic and I haven't been cautiously optimistic in a long time."

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